Increased risk of atrial fibrillation in patients with uterine fibroids: a nationwide population-based study

Abstract

Abstract Background Uterine fibroid, the most common benign neoplasm of the uterus, is associated with an elevated risk of cardiovascular disease. The link between incident atrial fibrillation (AF) and the uterine fibroid is unclear because earlier studies focused primarily on the development of atherosclerosis and hypertension. We aimed to investigate the risk of AF in patients with uterine fibroid. Methods This is a retrospective cohort study using the Korean National Health Insurance Service database (NHIS). From 2009 to 2012, a total of 2,574,349 women (20 to 40 years old) who underwent general health examinations were included. Diagnosis of uterine fibroids and surgical treatment status was defined by the international classification of diseases, 10th revision codes, and procedural codes from the Korean NHIS. The primary outcome was newly diagnosed AF. The risk of AF according to the uterine fibroids and their surgical treatment status was evaluated using Cox proportional-hazard models. Results Of the total population, the mean age was 29.76±4.27 years, and 20,682 (0.8%) were identified to have uterine fibroid. Incident AF was identified in 3,868 patients (61 in the fibroid group, 3,807 in the control group) during a mean follow-up of 7.3±1.1 years. Patients of the uterine fibroid group showed a higher incidence of AF compared to the control group (0.41 and 0.20 per 1000 person-years, respectively, Figure 1). Multivariate Cox-regression analysis presented that uterine fibroid was an independent risk factor of AF: hazard ratio (HR) 1.50, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.16–1.93, p=0.002. Compared to the control group, uterine fibroid patients who underwent surgical treatment tend to show a lower risk for AF (HR 1.22, 95% CI 0.79–1.90) than patients without surgical treatment (HR 1.69, 95% CI 1.24–2.30), though statistical significance was indeterminate (Figure 2). After propensity score matching, patients of the uterine fibroid group showed higher risk of AF when compared to the control group (HR 1.77, 95% CI 1.32–2.63, p<0.001), which was in line with our main results. The presence of uterine fibroid was consistently associated with higher risk of AF among all subgroups except for the stroke subgroup. Conclusion Patients with uterine fibroids are predisposed to an increased risk of AF compared to the control group. Careful monitoring of arrhythmia development would be warranted in patients of uterine fibroid and surgical treatment as it is associated with a modest risk decrement of incident AF. Funding Acknowledgement Type of funding sources: None.